If you want to avoid ear-bleeding, a la Vogon poetry, slide past the excruciating Sandi Patti intro on up to 1:00. These kids will kill their parents with rocks in about ten years. They remind me of myself and my siblings during our JW days. There are people who really like to see little kids acting all Jesus-freaky. You would think they would notice that kids act the exact same way about Barney, Batman, Elmo, Santa Claus and the Harlem Globetrotters.

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When all of Cinderella's finery changed back at midnight, why didn't the shoes disappear? What's up with that?

Oh it's clear what he meant. "Decide to believe, then act on it" is not at all the same as a phone number, something anasunakmoon knows but is pretending not to know. Interestingly, that is the same method of contact that all sorts of fake gods use as well. They, too, require that you firmly believe in their existence before you start believing that you're getting messages from them.

Tell me, anasunakmoon, if you wanted a relationship with someone, would you wait for them to start believing in your existence before addressing them? Or would you address them first, in order to demonstrate your existence to them?

Tell me, anasunakmoon, if you wanted a relationship with someone, would you wait for them to start believing in your existence before addressing them? Or would you address them first, in order to demonstrate your existence to them?

but, but, but god works in mysterious ways!! his wisdom so exceeds ours that we can't understand him (but why would someone like that want a relationship with us? Meh, I'll ignore that) You simply can't know gods will or how he operates--you just don't get it!

or something.

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...religion is simply tribalism with a side order of philosophical wankery, and occasionally a baseball bat to smash...anyone who doesn't show...deference to the tribe's chosen totem.

~Astreja

To not believe in god is to know that it falls to us to make the world a better place.

Tell me, anasunakmoon, if you wanted a relationship with someone, would you wait for them to start believing in your existence before addressing them? Or would you address them first, in order to demonstrate your existence to them?

All things around me such as my family, the sun, the moon, are God's divine demonstration addressing me that HE is.

Tell me, anasunakmoon, if you wanted a relationship with someone, would you wait for them to start believing in your existence before addressing them? Or would you address them first, in order to demonstrate your existence to them?

OK fair enoughI would address them first, in order to demonstrate my existence to them.[1]

Hopefully you are not trying to convince me that my God should do the same.

A god would be so far above us that, of course, a relationship with us would not be important to it. We would not be worth such attention, and indeed, could thus not expect the god to make the first move.

Yet you would have me believe that your god does want such a relationship. That changes things, doesn't it? Such a desire is not...godly. It's more of a human thing, isn't it? So why appeal to how a god should act, when the god is not acting in a godly manner to begin with?

All things around me such as my family, the sun, the moon, are God's divine demonstration addressing me that HE is.

[/quote]

All things around you are god's divine demonstration addressing you that he is what?

Do you mean that everything that exists is from god or is evidence for god? Or just the things you enjoy? Is malaria evidence for god? Is a flood that kills an entire village in Bangladesh evidence for god? Or is just your family and distant celestial bodies evidence for god? And which god do you mean?

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When all of Cinderella's finery changed back at midnight, why didn't the shoes disappear? What's up with that?

Oh it's clear what he meant. "Decide to believe, then act on it" is not at all the same as a phone number, something anasunakmoon knows but is pretending not to know. Interestingly, that is the same method of contact that all sorts of fake gods use as well. They, too, require that you firmly believe in their existence before you start believing that you're getting messages from them.

All things around me such as my family, the sun, the moon, are God's divine demonstration addressing me that HE is.

All products of a self-perpetuating natural set of processes. Your family is the results of cultural and biological propagation. The sun is the result of super-heated hydrogen. The moon is a result of a bunch of rocks and dust getting smashed together.

I used the word 'believe' because it(the big bang theory) is a theory.

So the "Theory of Gravity[1]" means it's only a belief that letting go of an apple will cause it to drop to the ground? Do you believe that letting go of apples will cause them to rocket out into space? Or maybe you believe everything propels itself randomly, and if we so chose; we could simply jump off the sidewalk and fly around Manhattan?

Or do you simply not understand what a "Theory" is in a scientific context? Yeah, I'm going with that one.

I know, I'm simplifying it to just being from an Earth-centric perspective, but the questions still apply.

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"You play make-believe every day of your life, and yet you have no concept of 'imagination'."I do not have "faith" in science. I have expectations of science. "Faith" in something is an unfounded assertion, whereas reasonable expectations require a precedent.

Today, right at this moment my God is introducing Himself to you through me.

I AM THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS, AND I SENT MY SON TO SAVE YOUR SIN WHOSE EVER BELIEVES IN HIM SHALL BE SAVED.

now you have all the freedom in the universe to choose.What do you say?

I say.....sorry, anasu - the day before you said that, Imhotep said to me:

"I AM THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS, ALLAH THE ONE AND ONLY"

And when he did so, I started to believe in Allah - which of course means that Christ was NOT the son of god. But now YOu have come along and said something different! Who am I to believe??!!

Today, a Hindu - let's call him Ardeth - said to me:

"I AM THE CREATOR OF ALL THINGS, LORD BRAHMA"

Which again means that what YOU have said cannot be true - Brahma never had a son called Christ!

So now I am in a quandry. Three of you are all saying "my god is the one - believe!" But you can't all be right. Unfortunately, when there are a number of competing claims, none of which has any more evidence than the others, there is no reason whatsoever to pick one over any other. But you say I must choose.....

Okay then....I choose to believe the Hindu, and believe that Lord Brahma created the universe.

Did I make the right choice? How can I tell? What reason can you give me to believe in your god, that the Hindu could not say applies equally to HIS god?

Reading over the posts since I was last here, I have lost interest in this discussion. Sorry, but it's more of the same just with a new theist who can't come up with any better arguments than the many others just in my short time here. That was part of why I ignored the "debate" between the "programs" and focused on the flawed premise.

And a correct analogy here would be like playing D&D and questioning the GM when he has a group of Klingons beam down in front of you.

I see nothing wrong with this. But in seriousness, I still see nothing wrong with this - it's a furthering of D&D's inherent what-if scenario generation. How do the players react to this change? Do the Klingons win or do the players capture themselves a nice new Vor'cha starship? Sure, the GM is going to get some funny looks, but there is still nothing wrong here. Also; thanks for the idea. *Evil grin*

If the players are expecting a purely D&D game then the GM is doing them a disservice. However, if they were players in one of my games they might be hoping the Klingons were the extent of the weirdness I'd be bringing in but they'd be wrong – especially since I don't care for Klingons.

I don't know if there's enough interest to create a thread about role-playing games.

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Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding. - Martin Luther

Oh it's clear what he meant. "Decide to believe, then act on it" is not at all the same as a phone number, something anasunakmoon knows but is pretending not to know. Interestingly, that is the same method of contact that all sorts of fake gods use as well. They, too, require that you firmly believe in their existence before you start believing that you're getting messages from them.

And while we're at it...any comment on this?

I do have something to say but it is not an objective comment and I already know it is not going to work for you if you are looking for an evidence.

Soooo I will see you in a little while. I have to leave the U.S. for personal trip

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And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness,and of judgement. Of sin, because they believed not on me (John 16:8-9)

I do have something to say but it is not an objective comment and I already know it is not going to work for you if you are looking for an evidence.

Soooo I will see you in a little while. I have to leave the U.S. for personal trip

Have a wonderful trip, anasu.

BTW....how did you plan and book your trip? Did you look at travel guides or websites for the country you want to go to, or did you just go with a feeling? How are you packing? Have you done any research on the temperature/rainfall of the place you are going, or are you just packing what your gut tells you to wear?

How will you be getting to the airport? Have you looked at the flight times, check-in times, read the details of baggage weights and security procedures, booked transport to the airport and allowed for traffic at various times of the day? Or are you just winging the whole thing and turning up whenever with a suitcase that you haven't weighed? Did you research how long your visa needs to run past the end of your stay? Does your credit card work where you are going? How did you arrange your accomodation?

The point - which I'm sledgehammering home - is that I'll bet your little personal trip has required you to make a whole heap of decisions based on research, and on looking at evidence and evaluating in when making those decisions. You know....all those things you say are irrelevant.

Once again - I hope you have a good trip. But if you have planned it the same way you came to your faith, I think the probability is that you will have a miserable time.....if you even get to your destination in the first place.

Final tip - DON'T believe the guy who asks you to carry a package back into the US for him because it is "medicine for his sick mother".

1) Even the most advanced AI would never question if a creator exists. The need for a creator is based on emotions (fear of death, etc) and computer programs have only logic, no emotion.2) The programmer could easily leave comments in the source code, something like (// creates comments in C++ source code):

// This program was created by YHWH3) Ok. You may argue the program can't read its own source code. It's like humans knowing their origin beforehand. Then the programmer would explicitly write a routine to tell other programs that he was created by him. See this pseudo-code (for non-programmers to understand):

// Program BRoutine X....say "We're all created by YHWH."End RoutineThen there would be no arguing. So, if God is a human programmer he's a very bad programmer. Which is strange for a supreme intelligent being that LOVES humans and want humans to acknowledge him and glorify his name.